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 constitution. There was genuine virtue in the substance of his reiterated advice that the queen should endeavour to maintain a position above party and above intrigue. But, although sagacious, Stockmar was a pedantic and a sententious critic of English politics, and cherished some perilous heresies. The internal working of the British government was never quite understood by him. His opinion that the sovereign was no ' nodding mandarin ' was arguable, but his contention that a monarch, if of competent ability, might act as his own minister was wholly fallacious. The constant intercourse which he sought with Melbourne and other ministers was consequently felt by them to be embarrassing, and to be disadvantageous to the queen. An impression got abroad that he exerted on her a mysterious anti-national influence behind the throne. Abercromby, leader of the House of Commons, threatened in very early days to bring the subject to the notice of parliament. But when it was rumoured that Stockmar was acting as the queen's private secretary, Melbourne circulated a peremptory denial, and public attention was for the time diverted. The queen's openly displayed fidelity to her old governess, the Baroness Lehzen, did not tend to dissipate the suspicion that she was in the hands of foreign advisers. But the baroness's relations with her mistress were above reproach and did credit to both. She had acted as her old pupil's secretary in private matters before she came to the throne, and she continued to perform the same functions after the queen's accession. But public affairs were never brought by the queen to her cognisance, and the baroness loyally accepted the situation. With the Duchess of Kent, who continued to reside with her daughter, although she was now given a separate suite of apartments, the queen's relation was no less discreet far more discreet than the duchess approved. She was excluded from all share in public business an exclusion in which she did not readily acquiesce. For a long time she treated her daughter's emancipation from her direction as a personal grievance. There was never any ground for the insinuation which Lord Brougham conveyed when he spoke in the House of Lords of the Duchess of Kent as 'the queen-mother.' Melbourne protested with just indignation against applying such a misnomer to ' the mother of the queen,' who was wholly outside the political sphere. Public ceremonials meanwhile claimed much of the queen's attention. On 27 June she held her first levee at Kensington to receive the credentials of the ambassadors and envoys. She was dressed in black, but, as sovereign of the order of the Garter, wore all its brilliant insignia ribbon, star, and a band bearing the motto, in place of the garter, buckled on the left arm (, ii. 273). There followed a long series of deputations from public bodies, bearing addresses of condolence and congratulation, to all of which she replied with characteristic composure. On 17 July she went in state to dissolve parliament in accordance with the law which required a general election to take place immediately on the demise of the crown. For the first time she appeared in apparel of state a mantle of crimson velvet lined with ermine, an ermine cape, a dress of white satin embroidered with gold, a tiara and stomacher of diamonds, and the insignia of the garter. She read the speech with splendid effect. Fanny Kemble, who was present, wrote : ' The queen's voice was exquisite. . . . The enunciation was as perfect as the intonation was melodious, and I think it is impossible to hear a more excellent utterance than that of the queen's English by the English queen.' A more disinterested visitor, the American orator, Charles Sumner, used very similar language : ' Her voice was sweet and finely modulated. ... I think I have never heard anything better read in my life than her speech.' On 19 July the queen held her first levee at St. James's Palace, and next day her first drawing-room. On both occasions the attendance was enormous.

A few days before (13 July) the queen left the home of her girlhood at Kensington for Buckingham the new official residence in London appointed for the sovereign. The building had been begun by the architect John Nash for George IV, but was not completed until William IV became king. He, however, disliked it, and preferred remain at St. James's Palace. No monarch occupied Buckingham Palace before Queen Victoria, for whom it was for the first time put in order. A contemporary wag in the 'Times' declared it was the cheapest house ever built, having been built for one sovereign and furnished for another. But inconvenience with which William IV credited it proved real, and it underwent radical alterations and additions at the instance of the queen and Prince Albert before it was deemed to be adapted for its purpose. An east front was erected to form a quadrangle ; the ground behind the house, the extent of forty acres, was laid out as a pleasure-garden; a conservatory was con-